


Dress Rehearsal Rag

by conceptofzero



Category: Homestuck
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-12-16
Updated: 2010-12-16
Packaged: 2017-10-13 16:57:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,463
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/139551
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/conceptofzero/pseuds/conceptofzero
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"His eyes are busy looking up at the stars. dreaming about what else might be up there. He will leave this world. that's as certain as gravity to Cra." The life and times of a pre-Felt Crowbar. (Note: very Crowbar-centric. Other characters make very brief cameos or appear near the end).</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dress Rehearsal Rag

**Author's Note:**

> This fic is 99% headcanon and it uses made-up names (Cra = Crowbar).

Cra is three the first time he hears the story. He's had his legs for a few months by that point, but he's also still got his tail, and it wiggle-waggles in anticipation. Cra's father carries him on his back, and the sweet sound of singing fills the night air as his family heads to the ruins.

There is an amphitheatre built in the ruins of a building more ancient than any of the others around it, built from stone and metal and decorated in the grim visages of the Conquerors. Father lets Cra sit in his lap as they listen to the Storyteller, who sings in a deep bass tone about the world before the end of the Conquerors and the Tale of Two Lovers. Though he is three and he is a restless boy, he sits quietly, spellbound by the tale the Storyteller weaves with words and song.

It's a sad story about a boy and a girl who met and were separated, the boy sent to mine in the north, the girl sent to farm in the south. They suffer for many years, never losing hope that they will see one another again. Cra eyes are wide as the Storyteller tells of how they escaped the dreaded Threshecutioners, running through the deep swamps of their world and hiding where the Conquerors couldn't follow. He can picture them running side by side, holding hands as they make their way through the deep marshes, fighting off crocodiles and giant leeches, eating nothing but moss and berries. Their love keeps them alive, and Cra soaks this all in like a sponge, absorbing every last word.

The Conquerors began to punish the whole planet for their actions, destroying the eastern swamps and laying waste to the breeding grounds. The boy and girl, now a man and a woman, could no longer stand to see their world destroyed and they came forward, offering their lives to spare their home. Cra does not cry when they execute the man, but he does weep a little when the Storyteller sings the woman's mourning song. He's not the only one, and more eyes are wet than dry when the last notes fade.

Just as they are about to execute the woman, the Gods rouse themselves from their cesspit and let loose the Endless Croak. The Conquerors were laid low and they bled out as the sound echoed through the universe, punishing them for their wickedness. Cra looks up at the statues of the Conquerors and their strange ‘hair' and ‘horns', and he tries to imagine how they must have bled, every colour of the rainbow pouring from their veins. The story ends with the woman taking the body of the man and seizing hold of a Conquerors ship, sailing away into the darkness of space to search for a way to retrieve him from death. Everyone applauds, including an excited Cra, his grief over the woman's song quickly forgotten.

On the way home, sitting on his father's shoulders, Cra makes up his mind, "One day, I'll travel to another world."

"You'll never go anywhere. All the ships are long dead, and no one knows how to fix them," Cra's father says. Later, when Cra is a man, he will reflect on these words and conclude that this was the first sign that his father was an awful one, "Dream about something real."

"It is a real dream!" Cra insists, eyes fixing up on the vast stars above. Just a day ago, they were nothing but bright points, but now he knows better. They're places full of people just like him, and that somewhere up there, there's a ship with a sad woman who needs someone to help her, "I'll find my way to the stars. I'll fix the ships."

His father says something dismissive, but Cra doesn't hear it. His eyes are busy looking up at the stars, dreaming about what else might be up there. He will leave this world, that's as certain as gravity to Cra.

\--

Cra is twelve when his father walks out the door for a drink and never comes back. He waits a month, the opening of the door causing him to run to it each time and see if Father has finally returned. But the figure standing there is never Father. It eats at him, and bit by bit, his love for his father diminishes and then extinguishes completely, leaving behind a boy who has learned the hard way how easily trust can be betrayed.

His mother does her best, but it's hard. Cra helps her set the table and Kwa helps their mother make dinner, and his five other smaller sisters are on their best behaviour, but it's not enough. The neighbours give them food and Mother cries when they do. Cra tries his best to comfort her, but all his kind words cannot make her cry any less. She hugs him tightly and tells him that she knows he's trying, but Cra knows the truth: trying it not enough.

Cra understands that they need money. He also understands that Mother can't go to work, not when Qua is still a tadpole and doesn't even have legs yet. He also understands that the charity will run out eventually, and when it does, his whole family may end up split up.

There's a restaurant at the end of the block where men hang out all day. His father told Cra to avoid them, that they were bad men and they do bad things. But they always have money, and they've got boys a little order than Cra working for them. And what does Cra's father know anyway? His father is gone. Cra looks at his sisters and his mother and knows that he's got to be the man of the house. He needs to be a better man than his father was.

The men are all talking and laughing when Cra approaches. A big fellow with a thick square jaw spots Cra when he walks up, pulling the cigar out of his mouth, "Bug off kid."

"I'm looking for work," Cra tells him, looking around at the men, "I'm fast and I can keep my mouth shut."

"We don't hire tadpoles," The big guy tells him, and there are some snickers from the rest. Cra's little for his age, and people always mistake him for a good target or a push-over. He knows better than to rise to the bait or to get angry. There are better ways to prove himself.

"Give me something to do, I'll run laps around your other guys," Cra promises, speaking fearlessly to these dangerous men. There's nothing to lose here, but everything to gain, "The cops don't know who I am either."

The conversation dies down and they look at Cra, really look at him. He doesn't flinch under their gaze, thinking about his sisters and his mother. Somebody needs to take care of them, "Fine," The big one says, pointing down the block, "You go to the butcher's shop and pick up a package. Tell the man behind the counter that you're working for Big Bre-ke. You bring that back here and maybe we'll talk."

Cra nods as Bre-Ke speaks, and as soon as he's done, he takes off like a shot. He's short, but he's fast, always been since he got his legs. It takes him no time to reach the butcher's shop and to talk to the man in the white and red apron. The parcel is wrapped in brown butcher paper and Cra heads back not so fast, careful not to bump around too much just in case whatever's inside can be broken.

He comes back up to the table and sets the parcel down, barely out of breath, "See? ‘m fast."

"Yeah, guess you are," Bre-Ke eyes Cra up, "Does your mother know you're here?"

"My mother's looking after my sisters," Cra tells Bre-Ke, and already seeing the next question coming, he answers that too, "And my dad ain't around anymore. That's why I'm here."

"Little man of the house eh?" Bre-Ke laughs and slaps Cra on the back. Cra barely manages to stay upright and his back hurts like hell, "Fine. You show up here each morning and you do what I say with no backtalk. If you make it through the week, maybe I'll keep you around."

"Yes sir," Cra promises.

"Tomorrow morning, right after the sun rises," Cra nods again, barely keeping the relieved grin off his face. He already knows that he's going to show up even before the sun rises, just to make a good impression, "Now beat it."

He would like to ask for an advance, but he's not willing to push his luck too much. So Cra nods and beats it, heading down the road. Mother's not going to like him quitting school, but he was going to have to sooner or later. Cra figured out a long time ago that he wasn't going off to college or university, or anywhere that required an education. He's mostly been waiting for everybody else to realize that.

The twelve-year-old heads straight home to eat and sleep so he's ready for the morning. He's thinking about money, and about how relieved his mother will be when they won't need charity anymore.

\--

Cra is fifteen the first time he kills somebody.

He's worked his way up, moving from running errands and playing look-out to acting as the driver and beating the crap out of guys who don't pay their protection money. The pay's good, and even though mother hates what Cra does, she's stopped trying to talk him out of it. It keeps everybody fed and it even gets them nice things now and again, like store-bought dresses and dolls with eyes that actually open and shut.

Cra's tagging along with Kvak on a shake-down, mostly there to stand in the back and look threatening and maybe hit somebody's knee with a baseball bat. There aren't any plans to kill anybody. They're standing in a general store and Kvak's doing his usual "it would be a real shame if something happened" spiel, and Cra's barely paying attention, more interested in the cute girl wandering by outside. She's got gorgeous green skin, and when she glances in, he smiles at her. The girl smiles back automatically, catches herself, and then hurries on. Cra wants to chase after her and get her name, maybe tease her until she hauls off and smacks one of his arms, but he looks back at Kvak to see how the threats are going.

He looks back just in time to see the clerk pull up a shotgun, and Cra doesn't think, he just goes for his own pistol. Kvak hits the ground and the shotgun booms in the store, the shells destroying a display of soda bottles behind Kvak. Cra's still running on autopilot and his hand comes up, aiming automatically and pulling the trigger. The clerk jerks back, and Cra gets a one-second glance at the hole in the clerk's head before he hits the ground.

"What the fuck?!" Kvak scrambles up off the floor, suit covered in glass and coloured soda, "Did you see that?!"

"I saw it," Cra heads up to the counter, keeping his gun out. He's been carrying this for a year now, and he's only ever used it to shoot down empty cans. Cra looks over the counter. The clerk's dead. It was a dead-on shot in the middle of his forehead, and he can see right into the clerk's skull and the remains of his pink brains. There's blood running out the back of the man's head, making a halo around his head. Cra feels... good? He's not horrified by what he did, but he's not feeling an adrenalin rush either. All Cra feels is a bit satisfied that he didn't miss.

"Did you kill him?" Kvak looks over the counter and goes dark green, "Oh fuck, you did!"

Cra puts his gun away and heads to the front, locking the door and flipping the sign to closed, pulling the blinds, "Call Bre-Ke and tell him."

"What? No way, you call Bre-Ke!" Kvak looks over the counter again and then reels back, "I'm going to be sick."

"Don't wuss out," Kvak's a good three years older than Cra, but he's acting like he's still got a tail. Cra finishes with the front and quickly checks the back of the store, just in case there's somebody hiding in the stockroom. There's nobody there, one small blessing, but he locks the back door too, just in case.

When he comes back, Kvak's sitting on the floor with his head between his knees. Cra walks over, kneeling down and getting a good look at Kvak. He reaches out and slaps Kvak twice, hard as he can. It works, and Kvak stops being so dazed, "You bastard-"

"Call Bre-Ke while I wrap up the body, and stop being such a tadpole," Cra tells Kvak, getting up and looking for something to put the body in. There are some curtains for sale and Cra uses them to wrap up the clerk's body while Kvak talks to Bre-Ke.

Bre-Ke sends over a man with some shovels and a car with a big trunk, and Kvak and Cra spend most of the night digging a hole in the swamp and tossing the clerk into it. The pistol ends up further into the swamp, thrown as far at Cra can. He's exhausted by the time he finally gets home, and he collapses in his bed, falling asleep as soon as his eyes close.

The next morning, Kwa wakes him up, his eldest sister shaking him awake, "Cra, get up."

"eeeh," Is his response as he tries to go back to sleep. Kwa hits him with a pillow and he finally sits up, "What?"

"Your boss came by and left some stuff for you," Kwa hesitates, "He seemed really happy. What did you do?"

"Hm? Oh nothing. He just knows how awesome I am," Cra says, and Kwa hits him with the pillow again as hard as she can. She storms out and Cra just gets up, still wearing last night's clothes as he walks into the living room. He's still a little shocked at how good he feels about what he's done. Everyone else said that you'd feel guilty the first time, or have nightmares or something. But Cra slept like a baby and he feels the same as ever, maybe even a little better. He heads down to see what Bre-Ke's left.

Turns out Bre-Ke's really happy because there's a nice new suit and a couple bottles of booze. But best of all, there's fifty dollars in an envelope, more money than Cra's ever had at one time in his whole life. He gives most it to his mother, who looks like she's about to cry when she counts it all.

"Cra, what did you do?" She asks and the sadness in her voice breaks his heart a little.

"Nothing I wasn't willing to," He promises her, pressing a kiss to her forehead, "Don't you worry about me. Go get yourself something nice to wear."

Cra knows she's going to keep fretting, but he also knows she'll spend the money, and that's all that really matters. As long as she and the girls are comfortable, then Cra's happy. And honestly, if all it takes to keep them going is a dead guy now and again? Cra can live with that.

\--

Cra is seventeen the first time he nearly dies.

Everybody knows Cra by now. He's a gangster and a good one. People do things for him without him even asking. When he eats out, it's on the house. When he goes into a store to buy things for his sisters, they give him discounts. Girls find him fascinating. Boys want to be his friend.

Some of the older guys give him a hard time, but he knows it's because Bre-Ke likes Cra a lot. Bre-Ke's always giving Cra the good jobs, sending him out with a new pistol and a name, and a simple instruction. "He's been skimming, shoot him", or "He's hiding another set of books, find them". And Cra does. He's not lazy like some of the other guys, he always digs his holes deep and buries his bodies far away.

People know Cra. That's the problem. Because it's not just other guys in the organization or people in the neighbourhood. It's other gangsters, guys who spend their lives trying to get in on Bre-Ke's territory. They know who Cra is and they know that Bre-Ke likes him.

He's walking home when the car pulls up beside him and Cra looks to the right to see who it is, expecting to see maybe Kvak driving around in his new car or somebody he knows, and instead just sees the barrel of a gun. The door pops open and the guy inside says, "Get in or we blow your brains out."

Cra knows that he's dead either way, but he gets in, hoping that maybe somebody's watching him step in the car right now. The door slams shut behind him and Cra finds himself stuck between two big guys, both of them holding pistols against Cra's side. Cra feels afraid; so very afraid, and says, "You guys got the wrong guy, I'm just on my way home-"

"Save it, we all know who you are," There's another guy sitting in the passenger seat, holding his own gun. He's got to be the same age as Cra, maybe a year older. The guy looks nervous, like this is his first time doing this.

"We don't have to do this," Cra says, looking around the car, "You can just say you never saw me. My mom's waiting for me, and my sisters-"

"Shut the fuck up," The driver says, sounding irritated. He's young too, eyes flicking in the mirror and looking at Cra and then looking back at the road.

Cra opens his mouth and quickly closes it as the guns dig into his ribs. The guys up front may be young, but the ones on either side of him aren't. They'll kill him before Cra can talk his way out of this. He puts his hands on his knees and feels dread building in the pit of his stomach. Whatever they've got in store can't be good.

The drive feels like it takes a million years, silence settling in the car so heavy and thick that it startles everyone when the driver beeps his horn at someone else on the road. The passenger barely keeps from shooting Cra in the head and Cra balls his hands into fists, forcing himself to breath in and out calmly. His mother's got to be missing him by now. She'll call down and somebody will tell Bre-Ke and somebody will have seen him getting into the car and they'll find him. They will.

Cra lies to himself, hoping that it'll stick, but it doesn't.

They finally come to a stop on the outside of town. Cra knows this area. He's got a couple of bodies buried around here. The fear is like a living thing inside of him, eating at his very soul. They climb out, forcing Cra along. The only reason he's able to move is because they've got their guns on him, making him take a few steps. He tries to prepare himself for what comes next.

Nothing prepares him for the hole in the ground, or the coffin beside it. Cra's heart stops in his chest and he freezes up. He bolts, not caring if they shoot him in the back. Cra runs as fast as he can, heading for the start of the woods. If he can reach them-

There's a sound behind him, and then Cra's hitting the ground, the weight of someone bowling right into him and smashing his face into the dirt. He struggles to get up, but the kid, the fucking driver, hits Cra in the back of the head and everything goes dark.

He wakes up in darkness. Cra tries to sit up, smashing his head against the lid of the box and he falls back down onto the ground, groaning in pain. His hands seek out the edges in the dark, finding where the coffin surrounds him. He pushes and comes across resistance. A lot of resistance. He's buried alive.

Cra panics. He can't help it. The box is so small and he knows there's limited air and he's got no idea how long he's been asleep. He could have been out for hours. There might be six hours of air left. There might only be two. His fingers scrabble at the box lid, trying to find some weak part, some place he can break or force or do something with. All he finds is wood and more wood, and Cra feels the fear overwhelming him, threatening to drown him alive.

He closes his eyes, forcing himself to calm down. It's not easy. But he's stubborn, he's always been stubborn, and he manages to calm down enough to start thinking clearly. There's limited air in here. He needs to get out. There's dirt in the way. Even if he gets the lid open, dirt's going to come in. He needs to be prepared for that.

Cra finally calms down enough to do an inventory. They didn't bother to clean out his pockets. He's still got his pocketknife, a present from his eldest-littlest sister Kwa, and he gets the blade out. Cra starts to work on the box slide, scraping away at two spots. It's hard long work, but there's nothing to distract him, nothing else he can do but this. He works on the wood, fighting the spikes of fear that flare up within him, and slowly begins to make a difference.

The pocketknife only lasts for a while, the blade breaking when he presses too hard. The other tools are mostly useless, and Cra begins to use his hands. It hurts a lot and he's glad he can't see, because he's sure the wood is starting to look like a massacre. His fingers check and recheck the edges of his marks, scraping always little bits of wood. And then, as he claws, his right hand pushes through the wood and into dirt.

He pulls his hand away as dirt begins to trickle in. The next part of Cra's plan goes into effect and he begins to shift the dirt to the far end of the coffin. As it pours in, it brings air with it. Not a lot, but enough that he finds it's not so hard to breath. Everything tastes like dust, but it's survivable.

Cra does this for a while, turning his attention to the other square and scraping it raw too. Dirt comes in two places and he shifts it down, becoming more and more cramped as he's forced on one end, shoving dirt to the other. Only as he reaches the crucial point does he try to escape, taking in a deep breath and pushing up against the wood with all his might.

There's still dirt overtop of him, heavy dirt, and Cra just pushes as hard as he can. He's rewarded with a creaking noise, and finally a few cracks. His lungs start to burn and he pushes harder, finding strength even he didn't know he had. The coffin lid splinters around him and finally splits at the weakened spots, leaving a hole. It isn't a big one, but it's still a hole, and Cra forces his way up through it.

His head pokes up through the dirt and he sucks in a breath of air, his breathing panicked and ragged. His body is caught in the coffin and he fights his way free, grabbing onto the edges of his own grave and pulling. The dirt comes away in heavy clods, but he gets himself out, losing a shoe in the process and ripping up his shirt and pants.

Cra pulls himself onto the grass around his grave, collapsing on the lip and breathing heavily as he tries to get himself under control. His hands are burning with pain, and he glances down at them. They're black in the moonlight, like he's wearing gloves instead of his own blood. Cra lies there for a while, too old to cry with relief, too young to be unaffected by what has happened to him.

He eventually gets to his feet, looking around. Cra heads for the road, holding his hands close to his chest as he walks. He isn't more than five steps along when he hears a car coming. His heart turns to ice. There isn't anywhere to hide, nowhere but the grave he just crawled out of. Against every instinct in his body, he goes back to it, kneeling down in the dirt and waiting.

Lights swung overhead, illuminating the trees around him. He hears the car stop and the doors slam open. Cra closes his eyes and sends a prayer to anyone who's listening that it isn't the guys who had buried him.

"Keep your eyes peeled," The voice says and Cra nearly cries in relief at the sound. Bre-Ke sounds pissed, and maybe even a little worried, "Who knows what they did with him-"

"I'm here," Cra calls out, his voice quiet from the dust he's inhaled. He grabs onto the edges of his grave and pulls himself out for the second time. Bre-Ke's nearby, and Kvak and a few of the other guys, "I'm over here."

They come running, dragging Cra all the way out of the grave. Bre-Ke gets a good look at Cra's hands, now bright red with the headlights to bring them to life, and at the grave and the broken coffin lid and the dirt still pouring into it, "Fucking hell kid."

He finds out later that it was Qaken sending a message, a little warning to Bre-Ke to stop sniffing around Qaken's territory. Qaken doesn't even make it through the night. While Cra's getting patched up by veterinarian who knows how to keep his mouth shut, Bre-Ke and the others are paying a visit to Qaken's home. By morning, Qaken's attempt at empire-building is over and his territories are now part of Bre-Ke's.

They send him home to his mother with a bogus story about hurting his hand moving boxes. Cra's mother doesn't buy it, but she doesn't suspect the real truth either, and that's all that really matters. The coffin story doesn't get passed around and nobody mentions it much. Cra's hands heal up pretty quickly and Bre-Ke makes sure to give him easy assignments until he's able to pull a trigger properly. Within a few months, it's like it never happened at all.

Except Cra is never okay with enclosed spaces ever again. Ever.

\--

Cra is nineteen when he gets married.

He's never had trouble with girls, not when he's grown up with six sisters and learned to navigate their constantly changing moods and whims. Cra's always known how to be that right mix of sweet and smartass, and there's always been a steady stream of sister's friends who look at Cra and see the sort of boy who is just dangerous enough to make their parents throw a fit.

It's not love or anything, just good times and that's all Cra's really looking for. Somewhere in the back of his head, there's a part of him that stays distant. He doesn't want to let someone in, just so they can walk out on him again.

And then he meets Gaeg and everything changes. She's Kvak's date to one of Bre-Ke's parties, and Cra's come with one of Kwa's friends, but within an hour they've both ditched their respective dates to go get drunk in the basement, flirting and swapping stories like there's no tomorrow.

Gaeg's the same age as Cra, and her parents own a butcher's shop. She's smart and funny, and she knows what Kvak does for a living, which means she figures out what Cra does pretty quickly. She's also a bit of a slut and they end up sleeping together in the basement while Kvak attempts to woo Cra's original and now-very-pissed date. It doesn't go so well for Kvak, but everything goes right for Cra for once.

He falls for Gaeg, not slipping into love but falling face-first, tripping down an eternally long staircase. It's mutual, and it doesn't take any time at all before they realize that this is serious in a way that none of their past relationships were. They're both stubborn people and they butt heads constantly over all sorts of things, from their political views to how to properly eat an egg to what they're going to name their firstborn. She writes letters and puts them in his mailbox when he has to go to work. He climbs the trellis on the side of her house at two in the morning, opening her window and slipping into bed with her. It's teenage obsession, but it's more than that, so much more than just infatuation.

Gaeg is the only girl who's ever made him feel like this. He doesn't just want to sleep with her or date her, he wants to keep her forever. Cra wants to open his heart up so he can put her inside and keep her there. He wants children with her, half a dozen boys and girls with her eyes and his chin. Cra wants to wake up beside Gaeg for the rest of his life, until they both grow old and senile. He wants to die before her, because he can't imagine living without her.

Cra proposes to her after the first three weeks, and then it's a whirlwind affair as they try to get a wedding organized as quickly as they can. They've both got huge families that they want to invite, plus Cra wants to bring Kvak and Bre-Ke and the rest of the guys he works with, and Gaeg's got a dozen female friends, and the biggest headache ends up being just finding a date that works for so many people. Bre-Ke gets them their church and a hall, and caterers and decorators, dozens of people who owe favours to Bre-Ke that he's all too happy to call on, with the promise that Cra will make it up to Bre-Ke. Cra can't put how thankful he is into words, but Bre-Ke doesn't need to hear them. He's still towers over Cra, even after all this time, giving Cra a pat on the shoulders and saying, "You'll pay me back. A man like you always covers his debts."

Kvak insists on organizing the bachelor party, which is less for Cra and more for Kvak and the other guys. Cra ends up sneaking out before the whores show up, meeting up with Gaeg and taking her up to the amphitheatre. It looks the same as it did when he was a kid, and they walk over the empty stage, Cra telling a slightly more ludicrous version of the tale of the two lovers until Gaeg breaks down into helpless giggles.

"I used to think I'd go to the stars," He tells her, lying on the stage and looking up at the night sky. She's nestled against him, her skin so soft and warm against his, "I though I'd just rebuild those old rotting ship husks and head up there. I had this dream that I'd find the woman, or maybe her granddaughter or something, still alive and travelling through space, and I'd make her fall in love with me."

"You're so silly," Gaeg's head is pressed against his chest, her fingers playing with the buttons on his jacket, "She left hundreds of years ago. Nobody lives that long, not even grandchildren. Not even alien grandchildren."

"I know," Cra doesn't tell Gaeg that he still sometimes thinks about the woman and the mourning song, and the maybe-daughters she might have had, travelling across the starry night sky. Instead, he just holds tightly to her, and asks, "Did you ever have a dream?"

"Once. When I was a little girl, I dreamed about meeting the perfect man and getting married to him," She looks up at him, and Cra's heart swells.

"I guess you'll just have to settle for me," He says and she hits him in the arm, making both of them laugh.

The wedding day is the happiest day of his life, bar none. Even after everything goes sour, he can't stop himself from smiling when he thinks about that day. He loved her. He still loves her. Loving her was never the problem. It was everything else.

\--

Cra's twenty-two and he's moving his way up through the organization like a rocket. He and Kvak are unstoppable together, a perfect pair. When Bre-Ke's busy, he sends them out to act as his right hand men, handing out jobs and organizing everybody.

It's a cutthroat business. He doesn't have regular working hours. Gaeg understands, right up until they start cutting into their time together, and then she doesn't understand why the hell Cra's getting up at three in the morning to get rid of somebody else's mess, or cancelling their dinner plans because somebody needs to be taught a lesson and Cra's the guy who does it best.

His loyalty is to Bre-Ke first, and his wife is just going to have to accept that. She knew who he was when they got married, and nothing's changed. Maybe he's got more money, maybe they've got a nice house, but he's still doing what Bre-Ke tells him. Cra's fine with that. Bre-Ke's a good man to work for. As long as you work hard, then Bre-Ke gets you everything you could ever want, more money than any man could ever need. Bre-Ke's the reason why Cra and Gaeg have this home, the reason why Cra's mother's house is nicer than any of the neighbours, the reason why Gaeg has all sorts of wonderful dresses and jewlery.

Cra and Gaeg fight a lot, but it's not so bad, because they always make up after they fight and the sex is amazing. Everybody told him that the passion would die down after a few months, when she stopped wearing make-up every day and when she wasn't packing him lunches. But they were wrong. She doesn't wear make-up and she rarely packs lunches, but they still screw on the table after a good fight, daring the damn thing to break and dump them on the ground, but it never does.

There's sweetness too, lots of it among the fighting. They've got a piano in the front room and he plays for her, making up songs on the spot. He's not a master or anything, but he's good enough to make Gaeg cool down and fall right back in love with him when he's singing about how her eyes are as deep and mysterious as the heartland swamps, or maybe make her laugh when he starts comparing other parts of her anatomy to the lush swelling hills that enclose the breeding grounds. They never do it against the piano though, he would never forgive himself it they broke it while fooling around.

On the nights when he's late coming home, the scent of gunpowder lingering around his fingers, he's glad to have her waiting in bed for him. She's asleep sometimes, and awake other times, and he always crawls in behind her, pressing his face against the curve of her neck. They talk in these moments, totally honest with each other in the darkness.

"What happens if you die?" She asks him, rubbing her fingertips over the scars on his palms, fretting softly by the light of the moon, "What will I do?"

"You'll survive," Cra promises, kissing the sweet spot on the back of her head where her spine meets skull, "And I won't die. I promise I'll always come home."

"Don't say that. Don't make promises you can't keep," And yet, she squeezes his hands, because they both know he isn't lying. He will always come home to her. Cra dug himself out of his own grave, he would dig himself out a dozen times, as long as it meant coming home to her.

His mother keeps asking about grandkids and he laughs it off, telling her that they'll show up when they show up. Truth is, they've been trying for a few months now. There's a room in the upstairs of the house with a crib all assembled and a rocking horse and a few other little things. The walls are a soothing green, the perfect colour for a tadpole of any gender and he sometimes dreams about coming up the stairs and watching his future child splash around in the shallow waters of the crib.

And while they prepare for a child, Cra proves himself every day at work. He carries around a toolbox in the back of his car with everything he needs. The cops have stopped him a few times but it doesn't matter because Cra always washes everything real good after using them. He knows better than to carry around bloody pliers when he's just spent the afternoon making some poor bastard tell Cra exactly what he said to the cops. He doesn't keep trophies and never makes them suffer longer than they have to, usually putting a bullet dead-centre in their brains once he's got everything they know. If you've got to suffer, you could do a lot worse than Cra, a lot worse.

Bre-Ke's proud of Cra, always bringing him along when the bosses have the occasional meeting on neutral ground. Cra keeps an eye out for Bre-Ke, making sure that things go smooth. Bre-Ke trusts him and Cra makes sure that his trust is always rewarded.

There's lots of guys at these meetings, all sorts of bosses and bodyguards and whatever else. He spots the two guys from his burial once, not the old guys, but the young ones, the driver and the nervous kid. They spot Cra too and they make themselves as scarce as they can, slipping out the back. Cra rests his hand on his pistol and seriously considers killing them before deciding against it. They're not the ones who decided to bury him in the ground, they're just the guys who got told to do it. And if it was Bre-Ke telling Cra to bury someone, he'd bury them too.

The only difference is that Cra would wait around to make sure they didn't dig themselves out. Because he's a professional, and professionals don't get sloppy.

He's got it good and he knows it, but more than that, he knows that he earned it. Cra's been working his ass off for a decade now and it's all paying off. He's got the career and the family, something most guys take twenty more years to figure out, and if he plays his cards right and keeps close to Bre-Ke, then it won't be long before he finds himself as something other than just a hitman. Bre-Ke's going to be head boss one of these days, not just a guy running a neighbourhood. As long as Cra keeps following him, then maybe Cra will find himself running the place he used to live.

And as far as Cra's concerned, that's a future to be looking forward to.

\--

Cra's twenty-five when he and Gaeg separate.

They never actually get a legal divorce, since they both can't stand the thought of actually making official. But it's official in every other way. Cra signs the deed to their house over to her and takes his things, moving into Kvak's apartment for the meantime.

Kvak's happy to have Cra join him in eternal bachelorhood, though it takes some getting-used to. Even though he and Gaeg did nothing but fight for the last two years solid, she always picked up around the house and sometimes even made him lunch, when she wasn't too angry with him. Kvak's place is always a mess, no matter how much Cra tries to pick-up, and there's rarely food in the fridge. The piano ends up covered in dishes and papers and whatever else Kvak can put on it and like clockwork, Cra leans it off. He doesn't play as much as he used to though, only doing it at parties when Kvak wants Cra to impress somebody. Funny songs don't seem so funny in a dirty bachelor's apartment.

He focuses entirely on his work. It's not hard. Cra's always been a bit of a workaholic. Now he doesn't have any reasons not to focus on it exclusively. Bre-Ke's always got something for Cra to do, whether it's getting rid of somebody who's been squealing to the cops, or beating the information out of somebody who's keeping his lips sealed. It's good. Cra needs to be busy. Bre-Ke never asks Cra what's happening with him and Gaeg, and he doesn't offer to get him prostitutes like the rest of the guys do. He's got a wife of his own and he understands what it means to really love someone, so all he does is give Cra a pat on the shoulder now and again, and as much work at Cra can stand.

He's good at his job, better than most of the other guys. It's because Cra's not a sadist. He doesn't get off on hurting other and he doesn't brag about how many men he's killed. Cra's a professional, and a professional always gets the job done right the first time. He doesn't get emotionally involved, and Bre-Ke's always very appreciative that Cra can keep work and morality so easily separated. Cra appreciates it too, when he's not wondering if the thing that makes him such a great hitman is also the thing that ruined his marriage.

Cra visits his sisters and mothers as much as he can. It's not always possible, so sometimes he just writes them letters, tucking a little cash inside for them. His mother pretends not to know what Cra does for a living, but some of his sisters don't see any point in keeping up the charade. Kwa's letters always come back as return-to-sender, but Cra sends them all the same, knowing that one day she'll break down and read them. The others are so used to what Cra does for a living that they never have trouble accepting the cash, though some of them are a bit too curious for their own good. He keeps them as far away from the business as possible, not wanting them to get involved.

Kvak ends up reading the letters to Kwa whenever Cra doesn't get the mail first, "Why do you bother writing her? She's not even reading these."

"I like doing futile things. That's why I bother cleaning up around here," Cra snipes back, attempting to wash the dishes, "And why I keep setting you up on dates."

"Ha-ha, wiseass. You should have been a comedian," Kvak wanders into the kitchen, paging through the letter, "Let me go talk to Kwa."

"You're not allowed anywhere near my sister," Cra's not joking. Kvak's had it bad for Kwa since she was sixteen. And though Kvak's a good friend and a decent mobster, he doesn't want him anywhere near his little sister. She deserves a husband who won't be up all night burying bodies or sleeping with whores on the side.

"You're such a hypocrite," Kvak sulks, but it never sticks, "If I had a sister, I'd set you up with her."

"Does your sister look like you? Pass," Cra reaches over, taking the letter out of Kvak's hand and dunking it into the sink, "And stop reading my mail."

"If people would send me letters, I'd read ‘em. And I'm not looking at anything really private," Kvak leans against the counter, "I don't touch anything from Gaeg."

Gaeg writes a little. It's less emotional than trying to talk over the phone. The last time they tried that, she ended up crying and Cra hung up on her. He lasted half an hour before heading over to his old house to apologize, and ended up spending the night, making love at a fevered pitch. They'd had a good hour of peace and quiet, but then a fight had started, just like a fight always started, and things went back to the way they'd been before he left. Kvak had noticed that Cra had been gone that night, but he thought Cra had been off with another woman, not returning home to see his wife. Cra didn't correct him. Somehow, sleeping with a barfly was less embarrassing than admitting that he was still desperately in love with the woman who had asked him to leave.

Cra swallows, trying to get rid of the lump in his throat, "Look, why don't you advertise for a pen pal in the newspaper? I bet there's plenty of old women who'd love to write to you."

"You think?" Kvak looks interested. He give Cra a pat on the back, "That's a great idea. How the hell did a drop-out like you get to be so smart?"

"Osmosis. I just put my hands on the paper and absorb it through my skin," Cra sets the clean dishes on the rack to dry. They won't last a day, but he's always been the kind of guy who does things, even when it's futile. He can't help it.

"I'm telling you, you shoulda been a comedian," Kvak heads for the newspaper lying on the table, and Cra just finishes the dishes, trying not to think about Gaeg as he picks little pieces of wet paper out of the dishwater.

\--

Cra is twenty seven when Bre-Ke is gunned down.

It's not a shock, not really. People don't retire in this business. You just keep surviving until either the cops arrest you or somebody else shoots you. As long as the cops don't get you, you've won, sorta.

But he's not ready for it, not when Bre-Ke was so close to head boss, not when everything was about to turn around. He's more messed up about Bre-Ke's death than he expected. Later, when he's not so twisted up, he's able to figure out exactly why it hits him so bad: because Bre-Ke's been Cra's father for the past twenty years. He's the guy who helped Cra get onto his feet, he's the guy who made Cra into a man, and he's the guy who always stuck by Cra's side, always gave him a share of the profits in exchange for loyalty.

At the time though, he's just a wreck. Kvak does his best, but he gives up after the first day and calls up Kwa. For once in his life, Kvak actually puts his own selfish desires aside and makes a convincing case as to why Kwa should stop with the silence and help him take care of Cra. And Kwa does, proving that she does still love her brother, even if she's been busy not reading anything he sends.

Kwa and Kvak get him through the funeral and the wake, answering questions for him when Cra goes deep inside himself and can't find anything worth putting into words. He does manage to say something to Bre-Ke's wife, and she thanks him for it, even if Cra's pretty sure what he said only made sense to Cra. And then, when that's over, they take him out to a bar and get drunk. Cra blacks out and doesn't remember anything about that night. He figures Kwa and Kvak probably slept together though, because Kwa leaves pretty quickly and Kvak moons around the apartment over her for weeks.

While Cra's trying to deal, there's a reorganization in the levels above him, and when he shows up for work, he finds that Vrak's now in charge. Cra doesn't like Vrak much, but he puts those feelings aside. He's a professional. Professionals don't get personal, even if they think the new boss is a prat.

But that's easier said than done. Things change. It's not that Vrak's more corrupt than Bre-Ke or more evil, or some other unquantifiable characteristic. It's just that Bre-Ke gave Cra a reason to be loyal to him and trust that the things Bre-Ke was asking were on the level. Vrak hands out orders to Cra right off the gate, stuff that Cra did for Bre-Ke, and he feels himself digging his heels in and thinking ‘you have no right to ask me for that'.

Kvak keeps Cra moving, even as the heels start digging in, "Just do what you gotta. Pay your dues and keep moving. Vrak's just nervous about the hit."

That's the other thing. Even if Vrak wasn't asking Cra for things he hadn't earned the right to, even if Cra felt half as loyal to Bre-Ke as to Vrak, he still would be having trouble. Because Cra's a loyal guy, and the last thing he wants to do is work for the guy who may have had Bre-Ke killed.

For three years, he's been living with Kvak. Three years, and he and Gaeg have slept together dozens of times. They can't seem to just break if off cleanly. His mother worries and his sisters have all gotten on with their lives, most of them doing things they love or married to upstanding guys. And Cra's stuck in this holding pattern, unable to let go of his wife, unable to move out of his best friend's place. He thought by now he'd be moving up in the ranks, but he's discovered the hard way that a hitman doesn't go any higher than hitman, even if everybody else likes him, even if Bre-Ke treated him like a son.

This isn't what Cra wants, and no matter how he turns, there doesn't seem to be a way out of it.

\--

Cra is twenty eight when he hears that Gaeg's pregnant.

It's Vrak that tells him after Cra shows up with another hitman's teeth in a hanky. Vrak's getting paranoid, demanding proof that the job's been done. It strikes Cra as tasteless and disturbing, but he does as Vrak asks and brings the teeth over when Cra's done. He puts the little bloody package on Vrak's desk, "He's been taken care of."

"Good," Vrak opens the handkerchief up to look at them and Cra glances at the walls of what was once Bre-Ke's office. All his old photos are gone, maybe given to his wife, maybe just thrown away entirely. It hurts to see how easily Big Bre-Ke's been replaced, "And hey, congrads."

The last bit confuses Cra, "On what?"

"You and the wife," Vrak pulls out a jar and dumps the teeth in, holding out the bloody handkerchief to Cra, "You know, on the baby."

Cra stares at Vrak and he feels like his world is folding in on him. Vrak doesn't know that Cra's not with his wife anymore. Of course Vrak wouldn't know, he barely makes an effort to know anybody who works for him besides his close and personal friends. Cra wants to reach for his gun and blow out Vrak's brains for telling him this. Instead, he takes the handkerchief and says, "Oh. That. Thank you."

He makes it all the way home before reacting. Kvak isn't around and it's a small blessing because Cra breaks down completely. It's not his baby. He knows it's not. They've had years of trying and years of not trying, and there was never a single pregnancy scare in all that time. Gaeg had blamed herself but she had been wrong. It was Cra's fault. It was his failure. Now she's found someone else, someone who can give her the child she always wanted.

Cra breaks his piano into pieces. He doesn't even play it anymore, not even for Kvak's friends. He hasn't been able to stand the sound of it since Bre-Ke died. Cra takes it apart, piece by piece, tearing out teeth from it's gaping maw and throwing them on the floor, torturing the strings with a passion that he's never shown when torturing any living thing. He breaks it's body, listens as the wood creeks and splinters and snaps, and he remembers vividly how it sounded when he broke the coffin lid, when the dirt washed over his face and threatened to kill him. Maybe it would have been better to have died then, when he was young and brave, when he would have been mourned by more than just his mother and Kvak.

He kills the piano, reducing it to a pile of rubble and curled steel wire, and takes one of Kvak's bottles of cheap whiskey and starts into it as the sun begins to set. Kvak is still nowhere to be seen, and there's nobody to convince Cra to stop drinking so much, or to leave his pistol behind when he steps out of the apartment.

Cra finds himself up on the roof of the apartment building, sitting on the hot tar paper, and staring up at the night sky. His eyes scan through dozens and dozens of stars, and he still feels like he wants to leave this place and go there instead. He wants to find the woman and her ship, and wants to ask her about what she saw out there, and if she ever found someone who replaced the hole left in her heart.

There are six rounds in his gun, but Crowbar only needs one of them. His eyes are still fixed up on the stars when he raises the gun and presses it to his temple. All it will take is just a slight pressure on the trigger, and then all of this will be over.

As he debates on how much his life is really worth, he sees the speck of green in the night sky. Cra looks closer, the gun lowering ever so slightly, and then suddenly the green is right in his face, crackling energy resolving itself into the shame of a man. Cra scrambles to his feet, whiping his gun towards the shape and pulling the trigger. The gun roars, and the bullet slows, slipping through a hole in the world that shouldn't be there. It disappears and the space fills with something solid, something man-shaped with a perfect white sphere where a face should be.

"Cra Kerokero," The man says and the words simply appear out of thin air, not coming from any particular direction.

Cra lowers his gun. He's already wasted one bullet on this guy. Another one won't do anything, except maybe make him angry. Cra's drunk, and suicidal, but there's a hell of a difference between taking your own life and daring some sort of... thing to do it for you. He reluctantly answers, "That's me."

"My name is Doc Scratch. I have a job offer for you," The cueball says, green electricity running over his polished head, "My employer is very interested in recruiting a man of your talents."

"I think your employer's got me mixed up with somebody else," Cra keeps his eyes on the figure before him, trying to decide exactly what he's looking at. An alien seems the most likely answer, but if he is, what the hell is he doing offering Cra anything? "Whatever you're looking for, it can't be me-"

"Cra Kerokero, age twenty eight, hitman and pianist," Doc Scratch interrupts, speaking in a calm and methodical manner. Speaking is the wrong word though, because the words aren't actually being said. There's something strange about the voice, a hollow sound that catches in the back of Cra's throat, "My employer is putting together an organization, one that requires someone with both such qualities. You would be well compensated and given opportunities that you can only dream about."

Cra stares at Doc Scratch. Part of him is sure that he's already dead, that he pulled the trigger and he's wasting the last few moments of his life on this. The rest of him is so drunk that it doesn't even feel any panic at the thought that this might be real, and that's the part that answers the Doc, "I don't need the money, and I've got opportunities. I don't think you can offer me anything I want."

"You have reached the end of your professional career. Vrak has no intentions of allowing you to progress through the ranks of your organization. Your loyalty to Bre-Ke is too well known. He will eventually succumb to paranoia and have you assassinated," Scratch said, his voice maddeningly calm and steady, like he's got every right to talk about things that aren't any of his business, "Your death will save your wife the trouble of filing for a divorce. Your mother will not survive your death and your sisters will blame you for her early demise. The only opportunity you have in this place is the opportunity to make others suffer."

Cra can't find the words to say. Everything the weird guy's saying is true, and it hurts like a bitch to hear it coming out of somebody else's mouth. Cra takes a deep breath, trying to clear the knot in his chest, "Fine, but whatever you've got, I don't want it either. I don't work for pricks."

"You may reconsider that statement once you hear my terms. I can offer you something that no one else ever can," Doc Scratch raises his hand, pointing to the sky. The green electricity courses down his hands, crackling loudly. Cra turns his eyes up to the stars, "You have always wished to visit another world. This is what my employer offers."

His mouth goes dry and he glances back to Doc Scratch. Space. Another world. Another planet. His whole life he's dreamed, but since he was twelve, he's known that he would never leave this world. Maybe this is a lie, maybe he's already dead, who the hell knows what's going on here. But everything about this guy is screaming alien, so it's not impossible. And what does Cra have to lose? Nothing. There's nothing left to lose.

"When does this job start?" Cra asks. Doc Scratch doesn't have a face, but somehow Cra gets the feeling that he's smiling.

\--

Cra is three days away from his twenty-ninth birthday when he finally travels through space.

He knows the stories about the Conqueror's planet, how the Endless Croak devastated the planet's surface as well and turned it into a barren wasteland, but he's not prepared for the moment he actually sets foot on the dead surface and feels overwhelmed by the magnitude of it all. The air is so dry compared to home, and everywhere he looks, he sees multicoloured sand and two full moons, and no water. It's alien and it's exciting, and he can't stop smiling no matter how hard he tries.

Cra's the first to arrive, and thirteen others come in quick succession. He actually knows a few of the other men, though they were usually acting as somebody else's muscle when he met them. The driver who tackled Cra is even here, the one who helped bury Cra alive, and they keep their distance from one another. It's a weird scene, everybody eyeing each other up and remembering old grudges. The Doc's given them all numbers, and they've more or less arranged themselves in order. Luckily, the driver's a one, so Cra's got five other people separating them.

He ends up standing near number nine, an older fellow with a scar running through the middle of his face. Cra recognizes him and strikes up a conversation, "Obob, right?"

Obob stares at Cra, the older man trying to place Cra's face and failing to, "How the hell do I know you?"

"I was one of Bre-Ke's hitman. You patched me up when I was seventeen," Cra held up his hands, showing off the old faded scars from when he dug himself out of the grave. Obob had done a great job and you didn't notice the marks on Cra's hands unless you were looking for them.

Obob nodded, clearly remembering Cra's case. It's not that surprising. Obob can't have treated too many kids for something like that, "Yeah, I remember you. You were a tough kid."

There's another crackle of energy and the Doc shows up again. But he's not alone this time. There's someone with him, a tall figure dressed up like a mummy. She's holding an eight in her hands, and she looks around, finally wandering over to Cra and Obob. Her face is in shadows, but she's got a voice like liquid silk when she speaks, "I believe I'm meant to stand between you two."

"By all means," Cra steps to the side to let her in, "You'll be easier on the eyes than him."

"I see you're still mouthy," Obob snarks, but Cra stops listening when the woman reaches up and pushes the bandages away from her head and face. Cra feels like he's been punched in the chest. Standing close to her, he can see that it's not exactly skin, but something harder, smoother, glossier, all of it dark as midnight, except for her eyes. Her eyes are pure white. For the first time in his entire life, he feels tongue-tied.

His staring is only interrupted when Obob introduces himself, "Obob, doctor and tailor."

She looks at Cra and he finally manages to spit his words out, "Cra, hitman."

"The Banished Quaziroyal, exiled Queen." She says and Cra feels like he did at sixteen, conjuring up elaborate tales in his head about the Two Lovers and the woman's exotic alien granddaughter, the one who was simply waiting for Cra to come along and sweep her off her feet.

"Gentlemen, lady," Doc says, and everybody goes quiet as he steps forward, "You have all accepted the terms of employment, and the powers you will be bestowed with. Uniforms and names will distributed presently."

Cra glances over at the Banished Quaziroyal, giving her a smile. Her face looks like it's not used to smiling, but she manages to turn the corners of her lips up ever so slightly. And for the first time in years, he feels like maybe things are going to turn out right.

It is the best and last day of Cra's life. It is the first day of Crowbar's life and only one of many best-days to come.


End file.
